


The Rosswood Disappearances

by TheElusiveOllie



Category: Marble Hornets
Genre: Alternate Universe, Anxiety, Friendship, Gen, Mental Institutions, Mystery, Panic Attacks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-03
Updated: 2014-05-03
Packaged: 2018-01-21 19:12:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 17,472
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1561007
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheElusiveOllie/pseuds/TheElusiveOllie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jay Manning is a freelance blogger/reporter who specializes in unsolved cases. He gets involved in a seven-year-old case, the Rosswood Disappearances, but finds that everyone involved seems to have something to hide.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Jay

Checking the clock on the dashboard for the millionth time that day, Jay tightened his grip on the wheel. He'd been driving for days now to this godforsaken location, and for what? A seven year-old story that was probably nothing particularly special.

Still, it was only a few days out of his way. It wasn't like Jay had anything else to do. Besides, he wanted to take a break from living on the road for a while. And luckily for him, his destination had to do with something he was very much interested in.

Jay checked into the rather battered-looking cheap motel, not far from the town itself. Already, he could tell this place's reputation was not a good indication of what awaited him in the town; the hotel parking lot was almost completely bare and Jay didn't run into anyone, not even staff, on his way up to his room.

He dropped his single duffel in one corner of the nondescript room and rummaged through it until he tugged out the second most precious object he had – his laptop. He booted it up and pulled up his newest case file: _"The Rosswood Disappearances."_

Jay had compiled every nugget of information on this town that was available online, back when he had non-shitty hotel wi-fi. He flicked through all the relevant articles he'd accumulated, reviewing the various news and police reports.

"Four missing persons," he read the headline aloud without really meaning to. "No suspects. And, to this date," Jay's eyes flicked up to reread the date – July of 2006 – "Unsolved."

That was the way he liked them.

* * *

The car had never caused a great deal of problems before – well, that's what Jay told himself. It wasn't like he had any funds for patch jobs, not when he had enough trouble living on the road and eating every night.

So, the next morning, when the engine started whining and the whole thing began shuddering precariously before Jay had even gotten into town, he was not surprised. He pulled over to the roadside as best as he could, getting out to check under the hood. Flipping the hood open, Jay was greeted by a rush of foul-smelling steam.

"Great," he growled, beyond frustrated. Jay didn't often let his irritation get the better of him, but this was honestly the last thing he needed. Furious, he kicked the side of the vehicle and immediately wished he hadn't.

He was too busy swearing and trying to ignore the fresh pain shooting up from his foot to realize that another car had slowed and stopped only a few meters away. It was only when he heard the slam of a car door that he noticed the cop – _shit, a cop_ – coming toward him.

"Car trouble?" he called.

"Looks like," Jay replied, desperately trying to force his grimace of pain into a smile. "Was on my way into town and it just..."

"Let me take a look."

The officer examined the mess beneath the hood for a few minutes.

"Looks like you're overheated," he explained. "I take it you've been driving for a while?"

"Couple days, on and off." Jay tried to keep himself from visibly limping as he went to study the engine as well. "Didn't think this would happen, though. Should I just let it sit?"

"For now, that's about all you can do. But you're going to want to take this to a shop as soon as you can."

"Thanks, Officer, uh..." Jay peered at the nametag. "...Kralie."

"It's no trouble. And you'd be..."

"Jay. Uh, Jay Manning." They shook hands.

"So, you just passing through, Jay, or...?"

"Well, I'm looking into an old case. That kind of thing interests me."

"So, what, you're some kind of a reporter?" The cop sounded less than impressed.

"Freelance, yeah. Mysteries, unsolved cases, you know." Jay could tell that Kralie didn't think much of his enthusiasm, but he didn't care. People rarely asked him about his business and he didn't get very many opportunities to share. "The Max Headroom Intrusion Incident, the Monster with the 21 Faces – I'm all over it."

"You ever solved any?" Kralie asked in a tone that suggested he was expecting a sheepish "no."

"Nothing as big as, you know, the Monster with the 21 Faces," Jay conceded. "But I've done some local stuff, cases that aren't as big-name. Those are the ones people overlook the most."

"I see." Kralie made a show of checking his watch. "Look, I should probably get going. Just let your car chill here for a few minutes and you should be fine for now. I'd still get it checked out though, if you have the..." Jay knew he wanted to say "money," but Kralie caught himself. "... _time."_

"Thanks."

As the cop turned to head back to his car, something occurred to Jay.

"Hey!" he called.

There was considerably more annoyance on Kralie's face as he turned to face Jay one last time.

"What?"

"You know anything about the Rosswood Disappearances?"

The police officer's expression changed from irritation to something Jay couldn't read.

"Yeah." He nodded slowly. "I worked that case."

Jay couldn't summon an appropriate response to that, so he stayed silent as Officer Kralie returned to his car. He'd obviously just brought up a sensitive topic.

" _Fuck,"_ Jay swore under his breath. He hadn't even begun investigating properly yet and he'd already found a way to piss off the locals. Hopefully the officer wouldn't hate his guts too much, because Jay planned on looking much deeper into this case. And that would be incredibly difficult if the officer who led the primary investigation had decided to heartily dislike him.

Unfortunately, there was very little Jay could do about it now. He returned to his car and, after another few minutes of staring angrily at the dashboard and bitterly wishing he'd kept his mouth shut, resumed the drive into town.

Regardless of whether or not Kralie had chosen to take an immediate dislike of him, Jay would have to talk to him sooner or later. All the same, he purposefully avoided the police station as he passed, choosing instead to park in an empty lot across the street. With nothing else to do, he simply sat in the car waiting as the town went about its business. Eventually he saw Officer Kralie pulling into the police station parking lot, meaning Jay had run out of excuses to keep stalling the inevitable uncomfortable conversation.

Jay finally got out of the car, crossed the street to the police station, and, gut tightening with apprehension, entered.


	2. Alex

It only took five minutes _(four and thirty-nine seconds, actually, but who was counting?)_ of Jay standing about the station awkwardly, unsure of how to proceed before the door opened behind him and Officer Kralie mercifully entered behind him.

"...Hey..." the officer said slowly, frowning. "Uh, didn't I just see you on the road?"

"Yeah. I, uh, I did tell you that I wanted to look into that old case." Jay tried to smile, but he imagined it must have looked like a rather stiff imitation of one, because Kralie didn't smile back. Then again, Jay hadn't seen him smile once since he'd arrived in Rosswood, so maybe that had more to do with the officer himself than anything else.

"I didn't think you meant, well, _immediately_." The cop sighed and ran a weary hand through his hair. "All right, fine. Come on back; we've got all our old case files in storage."

"Is this okay? I don't need to sign any agreements?" Jay inquired as he followed him. That would be a first.

"I'll get the paperwork for you later. Right now I just wanna get this over with."

"Oh." Jay tried very hard not to be offended and ultimately failed. "Okay."

If Kralie heard the despondent note in Jay's voice, he ignored it. It was growing more and more obvious to Jay that he was being regarded as more of a chore than anything else.

"Wait here," Kralie directed. He unlocked one of the doors behind them. Jay caught a glimpse of rows and rows of shelves containing battered boxes, most of which were crammed with yellowed files. When the officer returned, he had one of the dusty boxes in arm. It rattled as he set it down on the counter.

"That's everything," Kralie said, dusting off his hands. "Everything we've got on the Rosswood Disappearances."

"Wait." Jay peered into it and pulled out... "...A tape? No, wait." He began rummaging through the box's contents which, in addition to several old files, included stacks and stacks of old video tapes.

"The interviews were all recorded on video," Kralie explained. "They were never transcribed, so we just kept the tapes as hard copy evidence."

"Well, it's better than nothing I guess," Jay replied, trying not to sound glum. Sorting through this many tapes would take hours at the least, which meant he'd have to spend more time than he wanted in that crummy hotel. He could sleep in his car if he needed to, and he suspected that he would if he wanted to get through this much evidence.

"So how do you plan to report this stuff, anyway? You got a newspaper or something?" Kralie asked with a tone that was curious enough to surprise Jay. The officer had expressed next to no interest in Jay other than to express his thinly concealed scorn.

"I, uh...I run a website," Jay confessed, knowing full well how pathetic that must sound to a trained officer.

"A website," Kralie repeated flatly. The officer sounded as if he was barely holding back his derision.

"Yeah. A, uh, a blog. Gets enough hits a day to keep me going."

"You get paid for that?"

"Sorta, yeah."

"Paid well?"

"Enough to keep gas in the can." _But not enough to keep food on the proverbial table,_ he added silently.

"I see." Living _hell,_ Jay could just seethe meter of respect steadily dropping. Not that it had been very high to begin with. "Well, seeing as that's everything..."

Jay could tell when he was being dismissed. He followed the officer out of the back storage area and back to the front of the station.

"Look, Manning," Kralie said wearily, stopping in front of the exit. "I'm gonna be straight with you: most witnesses are deemed unreliable after 48 hours and this case is seven years old."

"What are trying to say?" Jay asked, with the creeping suspicion that he knew exactly what he was trying to say.

"I'm saying that you're not likely to find anything that we haven't. And even if you do, there's no guarantee it will still be relevant."

Jay knew when he was being looked down on, and Kralie's condescension towards Jay's efforts was coming off him in waves. For one strange, wild instant, Jay felt the incredible urge to shove Kralie's disinterest right back at him.

"Maybe I'm not looking for relevancy." He straightened up and looked at the officer in the eye. "Maybe I'm just looking to give some of these people a little closure."

"They've had plenty of chances for closure," the officer retorted frostily. "Seven years of chances."

"Well, maybe I'm looking to give them a little more." Jay was done with this. The rush of adrenaline and fear that had come with standing up to a _police officer_ gave him just enough courage to offer a tiny half-smirk as he turned to exit the station, box in hand. "Thank you for the tapes."

Jay felt entirely too proud of himself as he dumped the box of tapes and assorted files into the trunk of his car, but he didn't care. He hadn't stammered, he hadn't hesitated, and he hadn't let Kralie make him feel ashamed of his work _despite_ the fact that he was a _police officer._ That felt good. It was a first, but it felt good.

Jay paused to grab the some of the files out of the box, flipping through them in the front seat of his car. It was all there, just as Kralie said, but he had been right in one other respect – there was nothing in any of them that they hadn't already covered in the station. All the same, Jay went down the very short list of suspects, scanning each of the names that Kralie had mentioned – Timothy Wright and Jessica Chase, the only two who were close enough to the victims to know what might have happened. However, there was a third, hastily scribbled out suspect on the list, one that Alex hadn't mentioned, though once Jay squinted at the black lettering beneath the pen scratches, he could see why.

_Officer Alex Kralie._

"Well, Mr. Kralie," Jay mused quietly. "You never mentioned that you were a prime suspect... _or_ that you knew any of the victims." No wonder he'd seemed reluctant to talk specifics. Though in all fairness to him, Jay conceded that it could not have been an easy time for the guy. Why would he ever _want_ to bring it up if he didn't need to? Jay wasn't anyone with any kind of lasting authority here; just some stupid nosy online journalist who had no idea what he was getting into.

Still, if he had to be a nosy online journalist, Jay figured now was as good a time as any to start nosy online journalist-ing. His eyes flicked to the first suspect on the list, Timothy Wright. By going through his more extensive profile, Jay learned that he worked at the Operating Outlet,the local auto repair. He wasn't sure whether he should be pleased or disturbed at this coincidence, so Jay opted to ignore it. He needed to get his engine checked anyway.

After carefully putting all the files in the glove compartment, Jay pulled out of the parking lot and began surveying the rows of businesses and residentials for his destination.


	3. Tim

Jay pulled up in front of the auto repair shop – which Jay suspected might be the small town's _only_ auto repair shop – and thanked his luck that he'd gone now, because the sputtering sounds the engine was making as he switched it off certainly didn't sound good. He repressed a sigh, surveying the faintly steaming hood of the car mournfully. He would have to forgo staying in a semi-decent hotel room for a few nights after this. The thought of having to sleep in his car for the next couple of nights wasn't a pleasant one, but it couldn't be helped. Jay had no room in his budget to prioritize comfort over travel, not when he could only make his living by doing the latter.

"Can I help you?"

Jay jumped at the unexpected voice. He turned to see a man that looked suspiciously like the one Officer Kralie had described, from the sideburns to the permanent frown that resided on his face. And based on his employee nametag, Jay had come to the right place.

"Yeah, um." Jay indicated the faintly smoking hood of his car. "Engine got overheated when I was driving into town the other day."

"Hm." The man opened the hood and began examining it. "So you're the new guy in town I hear?" He sounded less like he wanted to make conversation, rather more like he knew it was the thing society expected him to do and he was wearily playing along. Jay dearly hoped he wouldn't expect him to hold up a decent discussion; unsolved investigations might be his thing, but socializing adequately definitely wasn't.

"Uh, yeah. That'd be me." Jay forced a feeble, fluttering smile, as if to say, _"Look! I'm friendly and welcoming!"_ When Tim didn't so much as look up from his work, Jay sucked in a deep breath, screwed his eyes shut for a minute, then stuck out his hand. "Jay," he introduced himself, trying to seem assertive. "Jay Manning."

"Uh..." Tim tentatively shook the hand with one of his engine grease-covered ones. "Tim."

"So you, uh, you worked here long?"

Tim shrugged. "Couple years."

Jay waited for elaboration, but his heart sank when it became painfully obvious that Tim was just as laconic as Jay wished he could be right now. He would have to pretend he could make casual conversation.

_Great._

"Pays well and...and everything?" Jay asked, probably in the _least_ casual small talk way imaginable.

Tim was unperturbed, still not raising his gaze from the engine. "Hours are good."

"Oh." Jay crossed his arms, registered that that might be taken as a gesture of impatience, then uncrossed them again. "Um. Neat."

_Neat._

_**Neat.** _

_Are you_ _**twelve years old?** _

Jay Manning stood there awkwardly, internally seething at himself, with nothing to distract him from his own cripplingly awful social skills but the clinks and hisses of his dying engine. He actually felt the physical need to smack himself very hard in the face out of sheer embarrassment.

Thankfully, either Tim hadn't heard or he didn't think Jay's pathetic response of _"Neat"_ was worth commenting on, because he offered no reply. There was nothing else to do but come clean. Jay silently rehearsed before speaking:

"Listen, I don't know if you've heard by now," he began hesitantly. "But I'm sort of a freelance reporter...type...person."

Tim actually looked up and made eye contact with that one.

_Wait. Now he's looking at me. He'll expect quality conversation. Shit. Shitshitshit._

Gathering his thoughts together, Jay tried his best to continue in the least contrived way he could think of (which, knowing him, was probably actually the _most_ ). "I look into unsolved cases and stuff. Like, you know...unsolved cases...and...stuff." His pseudo-confident voice gradually shrank until it was as small as he felt.

"Like the Rosswood Disappearances." It wasn't a question. Tim's scowl deepened as he returned his attention to Jay's vehicle. This was evidently still a sensitive topic for Tim as well.

"Well...yeah." Jay figured there was no use hiding his interest. "And I've talked to a few people already. Like, the guy who worked the original case, Alex Kralie, he said you knew some of the, uh...the...the victims."

"I was friends with one of them," Tim grunted.

"Right, okay. But people – well, Kralie – have also said that you...were involved. Like, you were there when they disappeared."

"I was in the area."

"So you...you were a witness."

"Look." Tim straightened up and closed the hood of the car and faced Jay, who immediately cringed at the _I-am-taking-exactly-zero-percent-of-your-bullshit- right-now_ expression the other man wore. "I get that mysteries are your thing and all, but I answered all the questions I need to answer seven years ago. I was brought in for interrogation more times than I can count and, believe it or not, I have no new, fascinating developments from what happened to the only friend I ever remember having. I can't help you."

The fact that Tim's voice hadn't risen or exhibited any anger as he chewed Jay out only made him feel worse. He'd plainly just overstepped his boundaries into something that was more than just a bad memory – it was a downright _painful_ one.

"Right." Jay forced a chuckle. "Yeah. Sorry. I wasn't...I didn't think."

"Well, if you don't mind, we should probably get back to discussing your car here." Tim rapped the hood of the vehicle. "It should be good to go but we need to talk rates."

"Right, okay." The topic of the Rosswood Disappearances was officially closed. Jay recognized the signs – he had overstayed his welcome with Tim. Jay subsided, nodding, and reluctantly followed the other man into the auto repair building.


	4. Jessica

Dead ends. Everywhere Jay went, he hit dead ends. It was to be expected, seeing as this was an old case and his arrival had resurrected some understandably painful memories that no one really wanted to focus on. But getting _any_ kind of story out of any of these people, much less something they hadn't already mentioned on the tapes, was near impossible.

Jay was back in his car, parked in the empty lot next to the police station. Seeing as his visit with Wright had yielded nothing but to establish the other man's firm dislike of Jay, he had turned back to the last pieces of evidence he had: the tapes. Going through them one by one on his laptop was tedious at best and incredibly boring at the worst, but there was nothing else to be done.

Jay had been frustrated to find that many of the tapes were unordered and unlabeled. That definitely wasn't police protocol. He'd never say it to Officer Kralie's face, but much of his work on this investigation had been sloppy at best. Even in the video recordings of the interrogations, Kralie's questions would tend to drift away from the focus of the missing persons. In all fairness to him, it was probably due to his personal involvement with said missing persons, but all the tapes did was make the officer look woefully incompetent and in over his head.

Still, that didn't mean there weren't several things worth mentioning. Jay had written down the topics that had come up the most frequently, namely the repeated mentions of Tim's close friendship with one of the missing individuals – Brian Hart – and the central crime scene – an abandoned, burned-out mental hospital nestled in the woods at the town's fringes. Based on the police reports, the hospital had originally burned down years ago and had never been torn down.

But there was something odd about the reports. Though the hospital had been burned into disuse years ago, there were records of a _second_ fire, one that occurred the same day that the four victims disappeared.

" _No remains were found,"_ Kralie's report read. _"But neither was any indication that anyone had survived."_

Jay made a mental note to visit the place, which had apparently survived two fires in its lifetime and was still standing. Why four people would willingly set foot in an abandoned fire hazard was still a mystery, but then again, Jay hadn't exhausted all of his leads yet. He still had to track down Jessica Chase. According to her records, she was the former roommate of another one of the disappeared individuals, Amy Woodward. Hopefully she would be more receptive than Wright or Kralie.

Unfortunately, it was late enough that there was no way she'd still be at a day job, so Jay would have to approach her at her own house. At least they wouldn't be in a public area like with Wright, which might have had something to do with his reluctance to say anything.

Jay pulled up in front of the address listed on the case file. All the while praying she hadn't moved in seven years, he knocked on the apartment's front door.

No one answered. Jay tried again. When, again, he was met with silence, he tentatively called out, "Hello?"

The door finally swung open.

"What do you want?" asked the young woman at the door, frowning ever so slightly.

"I, uh..." Jay was taken aback at the grumpy tone in her voice. He only let it set him back for a minute, however, and he pressed bravely on. "Are you Jessica Chase?"

"Yeah..." she answered suspiciously.

"Well, I'm Jay Manning, I'm a freelance...a sort of, um...I report...things."

"Whatever you're selling, I don't want it."

"No, that's not – I'm not – " Jay blustered, flailing to recover what little of his dignity remained. "I look into old unsolved mysteries and cases, like the, uh, like the Rosswood Disappearances?" He couldn't help the hopeful note that entered his voice as he mentioned the case, though he wished his voice hadn't leapt up two octaves in the process.

"That was seven years ago," Jessica replied dismissively. "Why do you want to know?"

"Because I think I can help? It's what I do. I, I look into unsolved mysteries and try to, uh, try to solve them. Like this one. Which I am. S-Solving."

_You sound like a fucking robot._

"You really think you can?" She sounded oddly hopeful.

"Only if you help me." Jay held his breath as she considered.

She slowly nodded. Relief flooded him. If she was even willing to help, chances were that she'd be ten times more helpful than Wright or Kralie had.

"Come in."

Jay entered the apartment cautiously.

"It's funny," he began without really thinking. "I didn't expect you to still be living here after seven years."

"Why not?"

"Well it's just, your roommate disappeared and all so I thought you wouldn't be able to..." Jay let the speculation die as he caught on to how insensitive that must have sounded. "It...Well, it's not really funny so much as just, uh, unexpected I guess," he fumbled. "Sorry. That...wasn't very tasteful."

Jessica shrugged. "It's been seven years. I've learned to deal." She led him into the small living room area. "I got another roommate since then. Well, they sort of found me." Jay waited for her to elaborate, but she didn't. He decided not to press.

"You want coffee or something?"

"Uh...no, I'm fine." Jay was hoping on sleeping tonight, and caffeine always made him jumpy. Well, jumpier than usual.

"All right, then." Jessica sat down on the couch and Jay sat beside her. "Where do you wanna start?"

"Well, I figured we could start with what you remember," he said cautiously. "Like...when this all happened, do you remember your roommate acting strangely the days before, or...?"

"No. Nothing seemed off or anything. We didn't see each other much in the day since we both had work, but she seemed all right in evenings and everything."

"What about her relationships with the other victims? Do you know how they knew each other?"

"It's a pretty small town. Whether we want to or not we all get to know each other eventually. I don't think Amy was particularly close friends with any of them, though."

"Really." Jay frowned. "So how did she get involved?"

"I know she was close with Alex at the time," Jessica offered.

"Wait...Alex _Kralie?_ Like, the police officer Kralie?"

"Yeah."

_That wasn't in the case files._

"And Alex was the one who knew the others," Jay noted aloud, mostly to himself. " _That's_ what the victims all had in common. They all knew Alex."

"What?" Now it was Jessica's turn to look confused. She leaned closer. "What do you mean?"

"Alex Kralie, you know how he was one of the suspects in the case and everything."

Jessica shook her head.

"Wait...you didn't know?"

"No," she muttered. "I was never told that. I thought Alex was managing the investigation but I didn't think he was actually involved..."

"It said in the official reports." Jay wished he'd brought them with him now. "He lent them to me to help me with the case, but they had him listed as a...a suspect."

"So do you know what he said in any of his interviews or interrogations or whatever?"

"No. Wait, hang on..." It slowly dawned on him. "Come to think of it, I don't think I could find any one of the interrogations with Alex. He gave me all the recordings of the interviews with the other suspects," he explained. "But not the ones with himself?"

Jay's head was spinning. If Alex was hiding something from him, it was no wonder this case had gone unsolved for seven years.

"So he gave you everything on the disappearances _except_ for the stuff with him in it?" Jessica asked.

"Yeah. But...hang on, why would he bother hiding how he was a suspect in the first place? I mean, if you didn't know then it looks like he didn't tell anyone."

Jessica shrugged helplessly. "I don't know!"

"Okay, yeah." Jay stood. "Listen, thanks for everything. I need to...I need to go..."

"What, already?" She looked puzzled.

"Yeah, sorry. But thank you, really."

Jay practically tore out of the apartment and back to his car. He dug anxiously through the layers of files, flipping through them with ever-increasing frustration.

When he was done, he slammed the trunk shut and dropped into the front seat, stunned. His worst fears had been confirmed – Alex hadn't given him any evidence that included himself.

" _Why,_ though?" Jay wondered aloud. "Is he trying to protect something? Is he just trying to protect himself?"

With a chill, Jay realized that if Alex had lied to him about this, there was no telling what else he'd lied about or what else he could be hiding.

_Or why._


	5. Liar

Jay awoke to the sound of tapping on the window. It took him far too long to become fully aware of his surroundings, and of the fact that he must have fallen asleep in his car. It didn't take him very long to groggily realize that Jessica was the one rapping at his window.

He rolled down the window, scrubbing one hand across his tired face.

"Jay?" He was too tired to interpret the expression on her face. "Are you...did you spend the night in the parking lot?"

"What?" Had he?

Oh _shit._ He _had._

"Oh, uh." Jay scrambled for an excuse and came up empty. "I didn't mean to – I mean, I wasn't trying to – I just didn't...I was busy and I must have – must have lost track of the time, uh – "

"Are you okay?" Jay finally came up with the word for Jessica's current expression – _concern._

 _Concern? For_ him, _of all people?_

"I – yeah. Yeah, I think I'm...yeah, I just...fell...asleep...in my car," he mumbled, utterly failing at concealing his embarrassment. When Jessica raised an eyebrow he rushed to justify himself. "With no intention of staying here or, or anything. I just...must've fallen asleep sometime while going over, um, over these..." He grabbed at the case papers that were scattered all over his dashboard and passenger seat in some complex web of organization that had probably made more sense to him last night.

Jessica was still staring at him.

"That...probably...ended up sounding really creepy, didn't it?" Jay didn't think he could salvage what little respect Jessica had possible had for him, so he gave up. "Look, I'll just...go."

"Do you...not have a place to stay?"

"I was staying at a hotel." Jay tried to sit up straight, his cramped muscles moaning in protest. He didn't mention that he'd checked out yesterday with no intention of returning. "Honestly, I didn't mean to crash here. At all."

_Not in this parking lot, at least._

"Look, it's all good. I was just heading to work and thought you might need help or something."

"No, I just..."

"Fell asleep in your car."

"Uh. Yeah." The longer he sat there, the more he began to wish he could think of something else to say. Finally, out of desperation, he jabbed his keys into the ignition and twisted far too aggressively. The car rumbled to life. "Listen I should probably, uh, probably go."

"Yeah, okay." Jessica didn't seem to know how to end the conversation either. "I'll...see you later."

"Right. Yeah. Bye." Fucking hell, could he just _not_ sound awkward for once? Thankfully, Jessica seemed to be out of earshot by the time he answered. Jay quickly pulled out of the parking lot (too quickly – he probably attracted yet another odd glance from Jessica).

Jay was halfway to the hotel when he realized he had no idea where he wanted to go. He doubted Kralie or Wright would be any more eager to talk about the case than they were yesterday. He'd essentially exhausted all his leads.

Then Jay noticed the photograph clipped to the topmost file on the stack that he'd hastily tossed into the passenger seat. It was one of the crime scene photos, depicting the ash-blasted walls of the burned hospital, where the disappearances had occurred.

_The original crime scene._

Jay made a not-quite-legal U-turn (yet another reason to be glad Kralie wasn't around) and headed toward the hospital instead.

He had to hike through an unsettling amount of nearly empty forest before he reached the hospital. He glimpsed two other people walking the rather poorly maintained trails, and even then he only saw them from a distance.

The hospital came up very suddenly. It was almost camouflaged, nestled in the thick woodland with not even so much as a fence or a 'NO TRESPASSING' sign to indicate its presence. The only clue that it had once burned down was the fresh growth of forest surrounding it, though Jay could barely pick out the faint scorch marks scoring the faded red brick exterior.

Seeing as there were no signs or warnings to speak of, Jay figured he could at least explore the interior a little until someone caught him. No one had told him he _couldn't_ take a look, after all.

The hospital's interior was even more unnerving than its exterior. Jay took note of the courtyard, overgrown as it was with thick, twisting brown husks for vines, as it was visible almost immediately after he entered. The walls of the hallways alternated between faded red brick and worn concrete, though many of the supports looked to be made up of fire-blackened wood that had miraculously survived two fires.

The place was entirely empty.

But it was really the _sound_ of the place that spooked him. Or rather, the lack of it. Outside, the telltale sounds of birds, the scuttling of animals in the undergrowth, even the tentative chirps of some very late crickets could be easily heard. Inside, however, there was nothing. Just complete silence.

He hated the way the gravel and debris crunched beneath his feet as he walked. A lump of dread settled in his stomach. The thick silence was doing nothing to ease his already frazzled nerves.

Something truly awful had happened here.

Jay jumped when a not-quite-distant _crash_ rang through the hospital's abandoned hallways. Heart thumping, he crept forward toward the source of the noise. Relief washed over him when he saw the crumbling ceiling, noting that bits of it had simply dropped to the floor.

The hospital was slowly falling apart.

Right. Okay. _No big deal._

Regardless, Jay continued. Everyone's general reluctance to talk straight about the case had only increased his determination to see it through, even if that meant he would have to go creeping through a burned-out, dilapidated, intensely eerie hospital to do it.

Fantastic.

Every distant clink and echo of the hospital as it gradually crumbled cause Jay to freeze up on instinct. He was the first person to admit how jumpy he was, particularly in high-stress situations that involved, say, trespassing on a potential fire hazard. Part of him blamed his jitters on a life lived perpetually on the road, but a large part of him just flat-out admitted that he was just... _that way._

The sound of not-all-that-distant footsteps sent actual jolts of pure terror shooting through him. That was most definitely _not_ part of the natural sounds of the hospital falling apart. Jay gyrated slowly on the spot, frantically trying to stave off the feeling of impending doom that was steadily creeping over him.

His mounting dread only increased when he realized that the sound of footsteps – _running footsteps_ – was _getting_ _closer._

Jay picked a hallway at random and sprinted down it. Adrenaline lent him the extra speed as he darted through hall after endless hall. He didn't care that he was hopelessly lost the minute his brain had picked flight over fight; he just wanted to get as _far away from this place as possible._

The scorched brick and concrete walls all looked the same, the empty rooms coated with layers of peeling graffiti serving no purpose other than to disorient Jay further. He pelted through each hall, turning corners at random, faster than he ever though he could run.

The footsteps followed.

Whoever was chasing Jay was much faster. The sound of their shoes pounding against dusty concrete soon drowned out his own wheezing, panicked gasps.

Glancing over his shoulder, Jay couldn't see anyone. The echoes of their running footsteps was making it impossible to pinpoint where he was, where they were, how long he had before they caught up to him.

Then Jay turned a corner and ran smack into them. He glimpsed a yellow-brown hoodie and a dark splotch of something hiding a face before his pursuer made a grab at him, pushing him to the floor, and –

_...and...?_

...and _kept running?_

Jay scrambled back to his feet and gave chase.

"Hey!"

The hooded figure didn't even turn or react to him at all, but whipped around a corner. Jay followed, but the adrenaline that had come with the terror of being chased had worn off. His breath was now coming up in rasping pants, his lungs aching, his throat raw.

"S-stop!" he managed to grunt out, but the person in the hood ignored it. They disappeared around another corner. By the time Jay caught up to the corner, the noise of their footsteps was fading back into the muffled silence of the hospital.

They were long gone.

Jay practically fell against the nearest wall and slid down. It took him several minutes of gulping and panting before he felt recovered enough to stand again, and even then, he gripped the cracked walls for support.

Once Jay's breathing had returned to a more comfortable and less painful state, he let out a roar of frustration and kicked at the nearest bits of rubble on the ground. He ignored his throbbing toe and paced the length of the room he'd ended up in.

He didn't know who it could have been or why they were there, but Jay was certain that they had something to do with the Rosswood Disappearances. There was no other reason for someone to be wandering in a ruined hospital with a hood and mask covering their face.

"But _why?"_ Jay griped aloud. "Why even _bother_ coming out here?"

He noticed the answer exactly two seconds later, scrawled on the wall opposite him. He had chalked up most of the writing on the walls to simple graffiti, most of it a mixture of expletives and crude drawings. But the message on this wall was scribbled in what looked like charcoal, and the message covered the _entire wall._

_KRA_ _ **LIE** _

"LIE" was heavily underlined.

_Lie._

Kralie was lying.

Jay figured the hooded person had left it the message there with the express purpose to lead Jay to it via a chase through the hospital. Why, Jay couldn't guess. They obviously wanted their identity hidden, so he had no way of knowing who it could be (though it likely wasn't Kralie, he reasoned) or what motivation they would have to help Jay.

 _Were_ they trying to help Jay? It seemed like the only answer. Leaving clues on the walls of a steadily disintegrating hospital was certainly an unconventional way to do it.

A chill went through Jay that had nothing to do with the hospital or the weather. It had just occurred to him that he had no idea what he'd gotten himself involved in, and it was becoming more and more clear that nearly everyone was willing to lie to protect themselves.


	6. Brian

Jay was parked in the lot across from the police station as he reloaded the box of tapes into his trunk. He only looked up when a cop car pulled into the space next to him.

_Kralie._

Fuck. Jay's hands shook as he closed his trunk. He didn't want to confront Kralie about his tampering with the evidence, not yet. He would have to act like everything was normal. Jay forced a smile as the officer got out of the car.

"Manning." Kralie's greeting was amicable enough, albeit with an astute lack of enthusiasm.

"Kralie." Jay forced a small smile.

"Look, you can really just call me Alex."

"Oh." Jay wasn't sure what that could possibly mean. Was Kralie... _Alex..._ genuinely trying to make Jay feel more comfortable in his presence, or was he reluctantly trying to be polite? Did he have some other agenda going on? "You can call me Jay, then. I guess."

"All right." Alex nodded at the trunk of Jay's car. "Packing up already?"

"Not just yet." Jay could sense the hopeful note in Alex's voice. That explained the over-friendly mood – he had been hoping Jay was on his way out of town.

_Nothing's changed, then._

"Any progress?" If Alex had been disappointed by Jay's answer, he did a good job of hiding it. Then again, Jay was admittedly pretty awful at reading people.

"Made a little leeway," Jay replied lightly. "Nothing too solid yet, but I think I'm going to look deeper into that abandoned hospital, where the disappearances took place, you know?"

"Really," Alex said flatly.

_Is he surprised?_

"Yeah. Figured it might help if I could take a look at the place, maybe get one of the suspects down there. Might jog something."

Alex was silent. A little taken aback, perhaps? Had he not expected Jay to find out about the hospital? Jay couldn't imagine that was the case – it had been mentioned numerous times in the paperwork Alex had chosen to give to him.

"Is that...Is that allowed?" Jay asked tentatively.

"Yeah, all right." Alex recovered swiftly. "Just make sure to meet me there before you go in. It's technically private property and a safety hazard, so I'll need to be down there with you so you don't get in trouble with the law or anything."

"Oh. Well, uh. Thanks. I mean, I bet you covered it in the initial investigation and all, but I wanna, uh, I wanna be thorough."

"I'm surprised you even knew about, it to be honest." Alex frowned. "It was barely even mentioned in the reports. Hell, I didn't even know about it prior to the case."

"Huh." Jay was beginning to get fidgety with impatience, so he came up with an excuse on the fly. "Listen, I haven't eaten since yesterday so I should probably..." Jay gestured vaguely at his car.

"Fair enough. We can meet outside the park area at say, uh, six?"

"Sounds good."

Jay dearly hoped Alex couldn't tell he had no intention of meeting him at the hospital, or at all that night. A plan was forming in his head to get his hands on the evidence Kralie was plainly trying to conceal from him, and he needed him out of the way to carry it out.

Unfortunately, it would also mean that Jay needed to ask someone for help.

* * *

"I need your help," Jay said without preamble as soon as Tim opened the door.

"How did you find my house?" he demanded, completely ignoring Jay's plea. He dropped the stub of the cigarette he was apparently smoking and extinguished it with his heel.

"I told you, I have all the previous case files." Jay held them up. "And you haven't changed your address in seven years either."

The perpetual frown that resided on Tim's face darkened. "What do you want?"

"I need your help," Jay reiterated. "I do have the police files on the Rosswood Disappearances...most of them. But I think the leading officer on the case, Alex Kralie, I think he's hiding some of them from me."

Tim's face betrayed a flicker of interest before it settled into his familiar scowl again.

"So?" So Tim hadn't gotten any less taciturn since Jay had last spoken to him. _Fantastic._

"So that could mean Alex was withholding evidence in the original investigation. He could have been trying to protect something, someone, even himself! Don't you see?" Jay hadn't even realized he was shouting. His grip around the files was tightening so much that his knuckles ached. "It could have been something crucial! It could have been who was _really_ responsible for the Rosswood Disappearances!"

"You..." The reserved scowl was gone, replaced with intrigue. _Good_. "You actually think so?"

"I'm positive." _Mostly._ "Did you know Alex was a suspect in the case? A _prime_ suspect?"

Tim slowly shook his head. "I never got any more information than what he told me. And he never told me that."

"He's hiding something. Something _important,_ " Jay insisted. "And I need your help to get it."

"My help?" Great, the grimace was returning. "My help with what?"

Jay hesitated. There really wasn't any easy way to approach this next idea beyond just hoping Tim would take it well.

"I need you to help me get into the police station."

"Well, you see, there are these newfangled inventions we call _doors_ and – "

"I need you to help me _break_ in." Jay hastily overrode Tim's jaundiced sarcasm to clarify.

Tim was already backing away, hand on doorknob.

"Tim, please." Jay didn't want to sound whiny, but he honestly didn't know who else he could turn to, aside from maybe Jessica... _maybe._ "You know your way around tools and mechanical things. You could do it. You could leave right after you get me inside, and if I get caught, I won't mention you at all."

 _"If_ you get caught?" Tim repeated skeptically. "The station won't just be _empty._ This is breaking the _law_ we're talking here."

"The station _will_ be empty tonight. Alex thinks he's meeting me down at the abandoned hospital, where the original disappearances took place," Jay argued. "And I'll bet you anything he's bringing backup. This town isn't exactly massive and there aren't that many officers to begin with."

Tim was silent, deliberating.

Jay tried one last tactic:

"We'd find out what happened to Brian."

Tim looked up sharply.

"How'd you – " Then he shook his head and stopped mid-sentence. "Right. The files."

"I know he was your friend."

"About the only one I had in this fucking town," Tim growled. Jay didn't think he was supposed to hear that, but Tim returned his attention to him immediately afterwards. "What makes you think I _want_ to know what happened to him? It's been seven years. What the hell do you _think_ happened to him?"

"I think you need closure."

"I've had seven years of it."

"You've had seven years of avoiding thinking about it. I'm talking about seeing the guy responsible for whatever happened to Brian – plus the other three victims – being brought to justice. Finally."

Tim shifted his jaw as he considered again before answering.

"I need to think on this. I just..." He ran one hand through his hair. "Believe me, there's nothing I'd love more than to see this case solved and the person responsible for all... _this..._ to suffer for what they've done but..."

"I get it. Here." Jay handed him a piece of paper. "My number," he clarified in response to Tim's inquisitive stare. "Call me once you make up your mind? I'm going to be in the lot across from the station for most of the day, so, uh...yeah."

The other man nodded. Jay recognized his cue to leave. He hadn't wanted to push Tim into this situation, especially not through emotional blackmail by name-dropping Brian, but he was low on options. There wouldn't be another opportunity to do this after tonight.

Especially once Kralie caught on to what was going on.


	7. Hide

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note: This chapter could have some potentially triggering content involving panic/anxiety.

_He's not gonna show._

Doubt and worry surged through Jay as he sat in the ever-darkening parking lot. Kralie had left five minutes ago, taking – as Jay predicted – several other officers with him. Jay knew he had maybe twenty minutes, half an hour at most, before they caught on to what was happening.

_Come on, Tim. Please._

The seconds trickled by, Jay's anxiety steadily mounting. He nearly jumped a foot when a knock on his car window startled him.

"Tim!" He scrabbled clumsily at the handle until he had the door open. "What are you – you came?"

"Yeah." Tim didn't look happy or proud of the fact. "Now let's hurry up and do this before I change my mind."

"Right, okay."

The station was dark, locked, and empty, just like Jay had hoped it would. Everything was going in line with his hastily constructed plan, which meant that something was probably going to go wrong very soon.

Right away, Tim got to work on the locks. Jay clicked on his flashlight and aimed it at the door to make his work easier.

"What made you change your mind?" Jay asked.

"All I want from this is what happened to Brian." Tim didn't even look up from his work. "Whenever you find out. Which you'd better."

The last sentence sounded more like a threat than encouragement, but Jay did his best to ignore it. Thankfully, he was saved from having to respond when the lock clicked and the door popped open.

"Thanks," Jay whispered. "I swear I'll get everything I can about Brian – "

"No." Jay looked up, confused. "I'm coming with you," Tim insisted fiercely. His glower cut short any further argument. Jay didn't press the point. They didn't have time.

They went through the records room, scanning the various shelves with rapidly building agitation.

"Nothing," Jay muttered. "There's _nothing."_

"Wait, why are we checking here?" Tim asked abruptly. "Why would Alex hide incriminating evidence in the most obvious place?"

"What are you saying?"

"If they're going to be anywhere, they'll be in his office."

"Do we have time?"

"We'd better. This is our only shot."

After locating the office with the worn plaque reading "Kralie," Tim immediately began working on those locks as well. Jay anxiously checked his watch. They had maybe five minutes, ten if they were lucky.

_Come on, come on._

"Got it!"

Immediately they began yanking open file cabinets, flipping through half-completed reports, looking in every spot they could find until Jay was standing in the middle of his office, eyes desperately raking the area for any hope of finding something they hadn't searched yet.

"Hang on." Tim was rooting through Alex's bottom desk drawer. From underneath stacks of old papers, edges yellowing with age and disuse, he pulled out a small, admittedly much less beaten-looking box and opened it.

"Are those...?" Jay didn't complete the sentence. When he peered closer at box's contents, the answer was clear.

_More tapes?_

"These have to be them, right?" Tim asked. He actually sounded excited. "The tapes with Alex on them. They've got to be."

"Yeah." Jay nodded brusquely. They couldn't afford to second-guess. They were nearly out of time. He grabbed the box and tucked it securely under one arm, brandishing the flashlight with the other. "Let's go."

They had just gotten out of the station, Tim fumbling with the locks, when Jay was startled by a loud _crash_ behind them. He glimpsed an indistinctly beige shape – _the hooded person?_ – darting away from several fallen trashcans in front of the station.

He tensed, considering giving chase until he noticed that twin light beams were slicing through the dark, coming right at them. Soon two other pairs joined them.

"Headlights!" Jay hissed, tugging on Tim's shoulder.

"The locks aren't shut yet!"

"No time. Come on!"

Tim didn't budge. He stood, frozen, eyes wide, staring numbly at the unlocked and half-open doors.

"Tim, come _on!"_ They couldn't afford to keep waiting. Jay grabbed the sleeve of Tim's jacket and half-pulled, half-dragged him down the steps and into the nearby bushes. They couldn't return to Jay's car, not with Kralie and several other cop cars so close by. It would be a dead giveaway.

Jay swiftly crouched to hide in the bushes, but Tim remained standing, as if in a state of shock. Jay had to grab him again and forcefully pull him to his knees to get him to hide.

_Why isn't he – ?_

Jay squinted through the darkness to see what was wrong with him. Soon he became aware that Tim was actually shaking, and it wasn't from the slight chill in the breeze. His eyes were still open and staring, pupils dilated, and his shoulders heaving as he sucked in gasps of air.

"Tim?" Jay breathed. "Tim, hey. You okay?"

No reply. Tim's heavy breathing and shivering only became more rapid.

_Oh no._

"Tim, hey," he continued encouragingly. "You gotta stay quiet, okay? We gotta stay hidden."

Tim was still unresponsive. Jay had the awful feeling that he knew what was happening, and it wasn't good. Tim's knees suddenly gave way and he fell sideways onto Jay, who managed to roughly catch him. He didn't know what else to do but grimly hope that no one would notice them sprawled in the bushes. He could hear the not-very-distant voices of officers as they approached the station doors.

"What's going on?"

"Are those doors open?"

"We've had a break-in."

"Someone call it in!"

_Fuck._

"Jay?" Tim whispered hoarsely, disrupting Jay's stream of thought.

"I'm right here."

"Jacket..."

_"What?"_

Tim tried to push a trembling hand into his jacket pocket. Jay understood and fished out what looked like a bottle of medication. He opened it and handed it back to Tim, who poured two small white capsules into his hand and dry-swallowed them. He leaned back against Jay's shoulder, eyes shut tight, breathing gradually slowing to a more reasonable rate.

"You okay?"

Tim shook his head jerkily, eyes still screwed shut. Jay took a moment to chance a quick look over the hedges to see what was going on. Most of the officers had fled into the station by now, and the ones that hadn't were looking in through the windows.

"Listen, we need to get out of here quick. We might not get another chance." Jay waited for the other man to agree. Tim gave a quick jerk of a nod.

"Come on." Jay tugged Tim to his feet, pulling one arm over his shoulders to support him. He had a very faint idea of where Tim's apartment was from here and how to get there by car, but there was no way he would be able to get the two of them into his car and drive off without being seen, especially with Tim in this state. But there was no other way he could see them getting out of this, so he started walking, working to keep Tim standing upright, all the while praying no one would see. He had the small box of tapes tucked securely underneath the arm that wasn't busy keeping Tim upright and walking forward.

Jay didn't know how long they walked down the eerily deserted road. It had apparently been long enough for each step forward to become an automatic response to the threat of danger that no longer felt real, far away as it was. Jay gradually began to tune out from his surroundings, so much so that he was surprised when Tim finally spoke.

"Thanks."

Jay struggled to find an appropriate answer, but came up empty.

"It's uh, no problem," he stammered out, keeping his eyes firmly on the road ahead of them.

"No, really." Tim was looking directly at Jay, pretty much forcing him to make eye contact. Jay was surprised that Tim was meeting his gaze fully. He never seemed to want to unless it was strictly necessary. "Thank you," Tim continued softly. "I was...that wasn't good back there, and you helped me out instead of ditching me. So thanks."

"Why would I ditch you?" Jay frowned.

"It's happened before."

Jay didn't really know what to say to that, so he let the conversation dwindle into silence. Eventually Tim shrugged his arm off from around Jay's shoulders so he could walk on his own.

It took them a long time (an _uncomfortably long time_ ) to get to Tim's apartment on foot, and Jay was relieved when Tim began steering them in the right direction. His sense of direction in a town he had barely been in was poor at best.

Once they reached his apartment, Tim began unlocking his door when he hesitated.

"Do you need to crash here?" he said delicately.

"Huh?"

"Your car is kind of, uh, all the way back at the station. Do you need to crash here?"

"Does that...is that okay?" Jay asked timidly.

Tim let out an impatient sigh. "You really think I would have asked if it wasn't? Look, you saved me from a panic attack tonight. I think that means I owe you."

"Um. Sure. I guess."

Tim inclined his head at the door.

"Come on, then."

Jay didn't know why he felt oddly comforted when Tim got him a blanket and pillow to sleep on the couch in his rather untidy living room, or why when Tim asked him if he needed anything else, Jay felt too choked up to say anything and could only shake his head mutely.

The answers to those questions later occurred to him as he stared at the ceiling at some ungodly hour in the morning, plagued by the familiar dragging sensation of being utterly unable to sleep. He realized that for the first time in a long, long while, possible medical emergencies and law-breaking circumstances aside, Jay might have managed to make a _friend._


	8. Confession

When Jay awoke, it was to the sound of someone opening a cereal box. His neck was stiff and his body cramped from the uncomfortable sleeping position he'd somehow forced himself into, but he stumbled to his feet all the same.

And was nearly blinded by the morning light streaming through the open window.

"Morning." Tim entered the living room to push a bowl of cereal, spoon and all, into Jay's hands.

"Um." Jay held the bowl awkwardly in one hand, his sleep-muddled brain not quite knowing how to respond to its sudden appearance.

"Breakfast."

"Oh."

Jay sat back down onto the couch and began to eat. Tim sat next to him. Jay wished he could think of something interesting to say, but after their very illegal escapades last night, he was entirely uncertain as to how he would go about that. Not to mention how he was pretty sure that was the most sleep he'd gotten in weeks, and his eyes were itching with exhaustion.

"So," Tim began tentatively, setting his bowl down. "About last night."

"Yeah."

Silence.

"Do you...wanna talk about it?" Jay offered quietly.

"Look, you probably got what happened back there, with the whole..." Tim gestured vaguely at himself. "...thing. You know."

Jay stared at Tim blankly.

"Wait. You _don't_ know?"

Jay shook his head. Tim sighed and rubbed one hand across his tired face.

"You haven't caught on yet?"

"Caught on to what?" Tim was acting as though whatever he was referencing was the most obvious thing in the world. Jay wished he wouldn't; in the confusing haze of not enough sleep mixed with the feeling of impending _holy-shit-we-broke-the-law-last-night_ dread, he felt like his brain didn't have much thought power left.

"The hospital! You know! The _hospital!"_ Tim stood up and began pacing agitatedly.

"What...what about it?" inquired Jay weakly.

"I was there! I mean, not just _there_ seven years ago, but there _before_ that! I was a patient there, at the hospital, for my whole life! The first time it burned down, I was there!"

"What?"

"As a kid. Come on, Jay, after last night you probably figured out I have some...issues. You think those started up yesterday?"

"Well, I mean, I'd...I'd _noticed,"_ Jay said timidly. Of course he'd picked up on Tim's very... _off_ nature since the first time he'd spoken to him, but he hadn't thought much of it. "I thought maybe it was a, a product of stress. Maybe some form of PTSD following the disappearances?" The rush of information was making Jay's head spin. "You never exactly told me what happened at the hospital. The reports only ever mentioned that you were present. I didn't know _why."_

"I've been like... _this_ for a long time now, Jay. Long as I can remember." Tim stopped his pacing to fold his arms tighter around him, hunching his shoulders. It was clear that this confession was taking a lot out of Tim, and he was probably uncomfortable saying even this much. Regardless, he took a deep breath and continued:

"So when Brian actually reached out and...and he, he was my _friend_ and it was...that was the first time anyone had ever..."

Jay felt as though a hollow pit was opening up in his stomach. The reports had said that Tim and Brian had been friends, but he had never thought that Brian had been his _only_ friend.

 _No wonder Tim's spent seven years pushing everyone away._ The thought made Jay feel, if that was possible, even worse than before. Brian had been Tim's _sole friend_ and Jay had exploited that sentiment for his own gain.

Tim was staring at the floor now, hugging himself even more tightly than before. He hunched his shoulders a little more as he pressed on: "And it was thanks to Brian I was even able to make friends with Sarah and Seth and Amy...even Alex. And I'd never had this many friends before and I didn't want to seem scared so when they said they were all going to meet at the hospital, I, uh...I went."

"But why? Whose idea was it to go to the hospital?"

"I don't _know!"_ Tim's discomfort was rapidly escalating into out-and-out distress. "When I got there I couldn't find anyone! I heard cries and I followed them, and next thing I knew everything was burning and I don't...I don't remember..."

"But you told the police this?" Jay felt bad pressing Tim for information, not when he was opening up and being the most forthcoming he'd probably ever been since...well, most likely since Brian. But they were _so close._

"I told them everything I just told you. Except..."

"What?" Jay was almost scared of the answer, but he leaned forward curiously despite himself.

"Except there was a reason I couldn't, uh, I couldn't remember before." Tim stopped moving and shakily sat back down next to Jay, gaze trained on the ground. "Right after the fire started, I started having one of those...attacks. Only it was worse then. It wasn't just a normal attack. It was more of a, uh, a..." He swallowed hard. "...a seizure."

Jay still didn't know what he could possibly say to any of this. He wanted to reach out to Tim, say something, _do something,_ anything, to help him when he was so obviously in pain, but he didn't want to interrupt and he didn't want to push him away, not when he was finally being so open.

"And after we were almost found the other night, I thought maybe you'd, uh, you'd leave. Like the others."

"They didn't leave, though," Jay tried to console him. "They disappeared. That wasn't their fault."

"It still feels like it." Tim finally looked up to meet Jay's eyes. "It feels like they left me alone. Again. And it's not like Alex ever reached out after all that. He just closed himself off even more, shut himself in his work. I don't think he's ever gone out of his way to talk to me since."

"I'm sorry." Again, Jay was at a loss for words.

Tim snorted and rubbed self-consciously at his shoulder, breaking eye contact. "It wasn't your fault."

That sounded more like Tim's familiar cynical self. For a while the two of them were still, wrapped in their own thoughts as the minutes fell away, until eventually Tim sat back down next to Jay. Still, Jay hated how distinctly insecure Tim felt over being so forthcoming with his painful past, so he gingerly reached out and placed his hand on the other man's shoulder. He felt Tim jump ever so slightly when he did so, but neither of them flinched away.

"We'll find out what happened," Jay said firmly. Tim turned back to face him.

"You think we even can?"

"Positive."

Tim nodded a little shakily and let out a slow, uneven sigh. Their conversation had clearly taken a lot out of him, and Jay couldn't say he blamed him, not when he felt the same.

Neither of them knew what could be said.

Until Tim straightened up and muttered, "Well, we'd probably take a look at that box, then. At least our little adventure last night turned up something."

In a rush, Jay remembered the box they'd taken from Kralie's office. Panic surged through him. Where had he – ?

Jay's alarm must have shown on his face, because it was Tim's turn to reach out and gently grip him on one shoulder.

"Relax, I got it here. Haven't looked through it yet, though." He pulled the box out from under the couch.

They stared at the box for a minute. The box stared right back. The same question ran through their heads – what could possibly be so terrible and important that Alex would hide these from even _official police records?_

"Only one way to find out," Jay muttered aloud. "Got a video player?"

Tim nodded. They had somehow mutually decided that they were in this together now, for better or for worse. And together they'd find out whatever it was that Alex was hiding.

For better or for worse.


	9. Hood

The first tape was nothing special – just a standard interrogation, with Alex on the other side of the table this time, about the suspect's relationships with the victims. The only thing worth noting was that Alex implied that he and Amy Woodward had been in a fairly intimate relationship at the time of her disappearance, which Jay found odd. Wouldn't Alex, then, have more of reaction? Wouldn't he be looking distant or shell-shocked instead of quietly, compliantly respectful of the interrogator's persistent questions?

As Jay and Tim were about to discover, that was only the tip of the iceberg.

_"So you were the only one who knew about the hospital prior to the event, then?"_

They had reached the third or fourth tape and Jay was beginning to tune out when the mention of the hospital jerked him back into reality. Suddenly he was rigid in his seat, eyes fixed on the video of the clearly uncomfortable Alex Kralie.

_"I mean, I mentioned it once or twice, maybe, to Amy. It's kind of hidden back there, in the woods and all."_

_"And you were unaware that it was a safety hazard?"_

"Well, it's not like I told any of them to go check it out." Kralie was getting defensive. "I'd read some of the material on it like, once, maybe. I didn't mean anything by it."

Jay sprang to his feet, realization sparking through him.

"He _knew."_

Tim was standing now too, pausing the tape to glare at Kralie's slightly pixilated face with undisguised fury.

"He knew the whole time, and he told me he didn't." Anger was coursing through him now, but it was likely nothing compared to what Tim must have been feeling. "I'll bet you anything he even knew about you, Tim, about how you used to be a patient there."

"He fucking _knew."_ Tim's voice was quiet, but Jay could hear it shaking with barely restrained rage. "The whole time, he _fucking knew."_

"He made a point of name-dropping the hospital to Amy," Jay hypothesized wildly. "He made sure she knew about it and that she would tell everyone else. And _then_ he made sure they would all go and meet there one night. And _then..._ "

"...Then he made sure they were all in the right place when he lit it up." Tim's face twisted into an ever-deepening scowl of disgust.

"He knew no one would suspect him since he was only tangentially related to the group," continued Jay.

"Plus he was an officer," Tim added. "Meant to keep the law, not break it. Of course they trusted him to be innocent. He had this planned out. He knew he could get away with it."

"Right." Jay froze, considering. "But _why?"_

They stared at each other intently, working through the icy sensation of betrayal to figure out what possible motivation Alex would have behind the setting the hospital on fire and condemning his four friends – possibly five, if Tim hadn't been lucky enough to avoid sharing their fate – to death.

But try as he might, Jay just couldn't find it. Kralie had seemed deceptively stable in all the interviews and whenever he'd spoken to Jay, with no indication that he was capable of cold-blooded murder, let alone that of people he was close to.

"Okay, so we still don't know _why,_ exactly," Jay conceded.

"And we still don't have any real proof." Tim sounded positively furious at the prospect. "All we have is guesswork and gut feelings. We can't make a court case out of that."

The two fell silent. They were so _close,_ but the answers they were both looking for were still so far out of their grasp. Jay only had one idea left in his arsenal, and it wasn't a very good one.

"We have to go back to the hospital," he said finally. "I found help there before and maybe I can find it again."

"Help?" Tim snorted skeptically. "What _help?"_

"A, a guy in a brown hoodie." Jay was well aware of how utterly ridiculous he sounded, but he honestly couldn't think of anything else. They were low on options. "They wrote clues on the walls. That was the only way I knew to even look at Kralie seriously as a suspect. They told me he was a liar."

"Yeah, they sound like a big help."

"And last night, too!" Jay insisted. "The only reason I saw those headlights in time to warn you was because they knocked over the trashcans as a warning! They've been helping me this whole time!"

"Right, well, if _you_ wanna go back to the hospital, you can do that." Tim was already backing away. "I'm done with that place."

"But we're so close! We can figure out the story behind this, Tim, I know it!"

 _"Don't,"_ Tim snarled, shaking his head emphatically. "You hear me? I don't _ever_ want to see that place again."

"Not even to find answers?"

"You weren't _raised_ there!" Tim spat. "You didn't spend nearly two thirds of your life confined to those fucking rooms with their fucking endless hallways! You never had to spend your nights screaming, clawing at the walls, crying because you can't tell what's real, and 24/7 there are fucking _doctors_ staring at you like you're their newest science project!"

Jay opened his mouth and closed it a few times, but in the end he gave up. Tim stood squarely across from him, panting a little from his vicious outburst. His angry glower had returned in full force.

Convincing Tim would be pointless. His mind was made up.

So was Jay's.

"Fine," Jay said at last, doing his best to keep his voice steady. "Fine. I'll do it myself. I'll figure this thing out and I'll get your answers, even if you won't help."

He didn't wait for Tim to think of a reply. He didn't cast the man a second look either as he grabbed his things off the couch, including the box of tapes, and left. It was only when he closed the door behind him that he remembered his car was _all the way the hell back at the police station._

Jay didn't think he had enough dignity left to go back inside and beg Tim for a ride, so he steeled himself for the long walk back.

Which was why he was surprised when none other than Officer Kralie pulled up next to him and got out of the car, waving a hesitant greeting.

Jay tensed and swallowed hard.

_Just act normal._

That was exceptionally hard to do when Jay knew that Officer Kralie was a murderer.

He forced a smile all the same and gave a half-hearted wave back.

"Getting a little exercise?" Kralie asked in a voice that was a little too cheerful to be genuine. He'd never spoken to Jay with a tone that wasn't hovering between contrived interest and flat-out indifference.

 _He doesn't know what we know._ Jay reminded himself over and over again. It wasn't helping.

"Yeah, I just, uh..." Jay didn't think he could get away with a lie. The parking lot was _right across the street_ from the police station for crying out loud. "I guess I left my car in that lot across the street? And I got kinda lost, I guess."

"You got lost in a town you've been around maybe once?" Kralie raised an eyebrow.

"Um. Yeah."

"Need a ride?"

"It's, uh, it's all right. I was just...just heading back..." Jay knew how feeble his protest must have sounded, and he hated it.

"I thought you were lost."

"Right! Um, I am. I'm just, um. I don't want to waste your time. You're a police...guy...after all..." Jay's voice grew smaller with each word until it died in his throat. He resisted withering underneath Kralie's searching gaze.

"It's no trouble, really." Jay didn't believe for one second that Kralie's smile was one hundred percent honest.

"Uh. Okay. I guess."

There was no way to back out of the offer without setting off any alarms, so Jay clambered awkwardly into the vehicle's passenger seat, gripping the box tightly to his chest and praying Alex wouldn't notice it. Thankfully, Alex didn't seem interested in conversation or in much of anything besides paying attention to the road during the drive, but then again, Jay couldn't really tell what could be going through the officer's mind.

 _He could just be wondering what I'm up to._ Jay tried to tell himself, trying to stay calm. The next thought that leaped to his mind _did not help:_

_He could also be planning the most efficient way to get rid of me._

The thought did not comfort him in the least. He could still feel himself shaking, damn it.

Much to his surprise, however, Kralie was silent for the entire trip. He pulled into police station parking lot without a single word.

"Thanks for the ride and all," Jay stammered as he quickly scrambled out of the car. "Really saved me a walk and I – " As he grabbed his belongings, the box of tapes went tumbling from the passenger seat and burst open on the ground, scattering the precious evidence everywhere. _"Shit."_

"Here, let me – " Alex offered, getting out of the car.

"No, no, it's fine, really – "

Jay scrabbled at each of the fallen tapes, flinging them into the box willy-nilly, but stopped dead when he saw that Kralie was standing over him. He had one of the tapes in hand, a stunned expression slowly creeping onto his face.

"Where did you get these?" he asked quietly.

"Wh – "

Jay wasn't even given a chance to react. Kralie seized him by the front of his shirt, lifted him from the ground, and slammed him roughly against his car. His face was mere inches from Jay's, twisted into an ugly expression of pure rage.

"I _said,"_ Kralie roared, thrusting the tape into Jay's face. _"Where did you get these?"_

"I didn't – "

_"Did you take these?"_

"Alex, plea – "

_"Did you break into my office? **Did you?"**_

Jay writhed helplessly against the car, trying to push Alex away, but the cop's grip was like iron.

He only stopped for an instant when he noticed a shape slinking up behind his attacker, an all-too-familiar hooded shape with a black cloth mask. The shape raised one gloved finger to the area where its mouth would be.

_What is he –_

Then the hooded person seized Alex, one arm looping around his neck with the other groping at the gun in his holster. Kralie let out a strangled yelp of surprise.

Abandoning the tapes and his hooded helper, Jay sprinted out of the lot and dodged traffic until he had made it back to his car across the street. He jammed the keys into the ignition and fumbled at the handbrake until he was able to pull out and speed away from the commotion. His heart was thumping in his throat, his vision cloudy.

Jay didn't even realize he was heading to the hospital until he parked in front of the wooded area. He didn't know why he went tearing through the dense woodland until he reached the chilling, deserted serenity of the hospital and could stand still in the middle of one of its many endless rooms and just _breathe._

The hospital was the only place in this town where Jay could still feel some sense of peace, some semblance of safety. He could breathe and relax enough to close his eyes and just _think_...

Until something hard collided with the side of his head, and pain shuddered through him, and all he could see was the cold, empty rush of nothing, and soon that was all there was.


	10. Kralie

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note: This chapter contains some potentially triggering material involving blood and implied mentions of suicide.

Jay's limbs felt numb, like they were weighted with lead. He could feel pain throbbing from a point on the side of his skull, shuddering through his entire nervous system. He tried to force his eyes to open but it was as if his brain couldn't decipher the command. The harsh smell of gasoline and cigarette smoke stung his nose and the back of his throat.

Finally his mind righted itself (accompanied by a fresh surge of stabbing pain) enough so that he could open his eyes. Hot pain coated the side of his face, so much that he had to grit his teeth to think past it.

 _Okay. You're okay. So think._ Think.

The shapes and shadows that made up Jay's surroundings soon drifted into place. He was still in the burned out hospital, sitting propped up against one of the walls facing the interior courtyard. Alex was standing not far off, smoking. Jay tried to push himself to his feet but his limbs still refused to cooperate.

Then he took note of the small chunk of cement, not far from he was. One half of it was bloodied.

Jay's brain might not have been functioning at the highest level currently, but he could still put two and two together.

_You are **kidding** me._

"You know, I haven't really smoked since my rebellious teenager phase," Alex said evenly, breaking Jay's line of thought. His tone was laden with mournful nostalgia. "You think I'd have forgotten the smell by now, but it seems Tim can't let the habit go."

"What..." Jay tried to speak, but promptly inhaled the overpowering scent of gasoline and started coughing. He rapidly became aware of the horrifying fact that his surroundings were soaked in the stuff.

"No one will wonder what happened to you," Kralie continued. He hadn't even bothered to face Jay. He sounded strangely hopeless, empty and completely without any further options. "This place is a massive fire hazard, and everyone knows you wouldn't be able to resist taking the risk for the sake of _one good case."_

Again, Jay tried to stand, but before he'd so much as shifted in place, more agony shot through him.

"I wouldn't." Finally Alex turned. "You've been badly concussed and your motor functions are still out of commission."

"You hit me..." Jay ground out from between clenched teeth. "...with a _block of cement."_

Alex shrugged. "Only a little one. I don't have my gun anymore, so I had to improvise."

"You could have shattered my skull!"

"Yeah." The officer kicked at a battered cardboard box that lay next to several empty, discarded gas cans. Jay stared at it. He could guess what was inside.

_The tapes. The evidence._

_Fuck._

Alex continued: "But I didn't. This seems...well, much more right. Every last remaining piece of evidence from the Rosswood Disappearances case, together at last. And now, together, they'll all burn."

"The truth is still out there. People _will_ find out," Jay insisted, stalling. He was desperately trying - and failing - to ignore the strong, steady ache that was still pulsing through his entire body. He was certain Alex could tell he was in no position to put up any kind of fight. He could feel his body shivering uncontrollably as again and again he struggled to rise, and again and again he was unable to.

All the same, there was no way he was letting Alex follow through on this.

"Who's gonna find out?" Alex asked. "You're not gonna be around to tell them. And neither will I."

Jay's breath stuck in his throat. "You mean – "

"We're both burning in here. Us and the tapes." Alex extinguished the dying cigarette with a pinch of his fingers. He rooted around in his pockets until he came up with a box of matches.

"Just, just tell me," Jay panted, panic creeping up into his throat to make his breathing labored and his voice to shake even more. He needed to keep Alex from lighting those matches, at whatever cost. "At least one thing: _why?"_

"You think I had a _choice?"_ Alex's face contorted into a look of pure anguish as he spat out the words. "You think I _wanted to?"_

Regret, misery, pain all flitted across Kralie's gaunt, tired features. The shadows cast by the angular halls of the hospital threw his face into sharp relief, making him look strange and unearthly, almost inhuman.

 _"He made me,"_ he whispered, barely loud enough for Jay to hear. Jay wanted to ask who or what, spiraling ever deeper into his intense confusion, but Alex had already dropped his sunken gaze from the other man's face and returned his attention to the matchbox.

"Wait – Alex – you don't have to do this," Once again, Jay wildly tried to keep Alex's attention away from lighting the matches. "We can work this out."

"We can't." He drew one of the matches out. Jay tensed. "Seven years and I thought I'd learn to live with it. But I haven't." The match hissed as Alex struck it and held the trembling flame in front of him with a shaking hand. "I can't live at all."

The _click_ of a pistol being cocked caused them both to look up.

_You –_

It was the hooded figure, silent as always, with Alex Kralie's gun pointed directly its owner's head. The hooded person's hand was shaking, but they were standing close enough to Alex that Jay knew they couldn't possibly miss.

All three of them stayed there, frozen in some obscene parody of a tableau for a split second as no one quite knew how to react.

Then Alex let out a hiss of pain and dropped the match as it burned him.

The effect was instantaneous. The tiny live flame hit the ground and immediately a sheet of flame _whooshed_ up from the oily layers of gasoline coating the floor. Alex staggered backwards, letting out a yelp of surprise. Jay quickly rolled away from the sudden burst of fire but the blaze was already spreading, ripping through the gas-soaked surfaces of the old hospital, licking hungrily toward coal-blackened rafters that had miraculously survived two fires but would never survive a third.

Jay was stuck, knowing full well the chances of getting out of this were slim at _best_. His body still ached, his arms and legs still refused to respond to the imminent danger, and now the thick, cloying smoke was beginning to make him cough – hoarse, painful hacks that sent tremors through his whole body. He struggled on the burning floor for a second, managing to push himself momentarily to his feet, but the act only made him dizzy. He groped wildly for some sort of support, but he was surrounded by flames. He couldn't even see Alex anymore.

Then something caught him and pressed a thick cloth to his mouth, shielding him from the worst of the smoke. Jay glimpsed the box of tapes, the final, damning evidence against Alex Kralie, and shut his eyes in despair when the fire swallowed it from sight.

He quickly shook the distraction aside. The tapes were beyond saving, and if they didn't start searching for a way out, they could be next.

_They._

Jay had almost forgotten. He cast a glance to look at his hooded, masked savior, who was now the only thing keeping him standing. Only they weren't hooded or masked anymore.

_"Jessica?"  
_

"Not a good time," she panted, covering her nose and mouth to keep some of the smoke out. "Right now we're getting out. We'll talk logistics later."

"How are we supposed to get out?" Jay yelled through the roar of the flames. When Jessica didn't respond, he opened his mouth to ask again but only succeeded in inhaling a mouthful of hot ash.

"Jay?" Jessica looked back at him. Lungs on fire, Jay could only cough. Again, Jessica pushed the cloth to his face to filter the smoke. As soon as he could breathe freely again, Jay glanced at it and realized it was the black cloth mask that she had must have worn to hide her face. Closer inspection revealed that it actually had two red eyes and a down-turned frowning mouth painted on it. Jay had to fight back the bizarre urge to giggle at the absurdity of the thing. The thought that Jessica had been his mysterious hooded helper all along felt strange, almost surreal, but Jay quickly quelled his amusement, choosing not to confront the thought. He needed to focus. He needed to _think._

Which was difficult enough with his head pounding the way it was, but the fire was only spreading, getting hotter, and the smoke kept piling in around them. Then a thought flashed through Jay's head.

"The courtyard," he panted.

"What?"

"The courtyard! I remember how to get out – the exit is just near it!"

"You're sure?" Jessica demanded. "If you're wrong – "

"I'm sure," Jay lied. He couldn't be 100% certain since the whole "just got hit on the head with a fucking _brick"_ thing was making it harder and harder to concentrate, but he remembered the layout of this place enough to be reasonably confident he was right.

"Which way?"

"There..." Jay indicated the corridor running alongside the nearest edge of the courtyard. They started forward, Jay leaning heavily on Jessica. They hadn't gotten very far when they heard the telltale creaking of old, worn down rafters finally giving way.

Directly above the spot where they were standing.

"Move!" Jessica practically tackled Jay, sending them both sprawling as the rafters finally gave way. They smashed to the ground with an explosion of sparks and burning dry rot.

The roar of the flames, mixed with the ever-present pain stabbing at the side of his head, already had Jay disoriented, but when he'd hit the ground Jessica had rolled away from him. His hands scrabbled across the too-hot floor of the old building in desperate search for her.

"Jessica!" Jay called out. His voice came out rasping and dry from all the smoke he'd breathed in, so much so that he barely recognized it. "Jessica?"

A hand grasped his and tugged him roughly to his feet. He felt himself being pushed in one direction, but in his semiconscious state he couldn't discern to where or how.

"Hold on." The voice wasn't Jessica's, but it wasn't Alex's either.

_So who..._

_"Tim?"_ Jay breathed, hardly daring to believe it.

_He came anyway?_

"Hold _on,"_ was the only reply. Jay felt something shove him sharply in the small of his back and he tumbled forward. For one terrifying moment, he felt nothing beneath him, but then he landed, hard, on solid ground.

Which hurt.

But it was also startlingly cool. When Jay's brain stopped scrambling itself, he was able to slowly push himself upright. He saw Jessica sitting up beside him and got a chance to see where they'd ended up.

The sound and heat from the flames still scorched the rest of the hospital, but where they were now, all Jay could see were pipes. Pipes and a dark, cramped crawlspace that extended farther than Jay cared to think about.

"Maintenance tunnels," their rescuer, _Tim_ of all people, explained, dropping down into the darkened space with them. "We'll be safe here, at least until help arrives."

"Are you sure?" Jessica demanded.

"Worked for me before."

"Back when you were a patient here," Jay said slowly as the realization dawned on him. "When you were little, the first time this place burned down. This is where you hid."

"Traumatized for life, but I lived," Tim explained lightly, in a tone that made a long history of childhood illness and suffering sound like a discussion of the weather. "The fire can't reach us down here."

"What about Alex?" Jay asked. He leaned against the wall for support. The initial surge of adrenaline that had come with the fear of being burned alive had all but faded. His limbs felt like jelly again, not to mention how the dull pounding ache in his head had returned in full force.

"No idea," Jessica answered. "Lost sight of him as soon as the fire started."

"Hang on." Tim eyed the pale brown hoodie she wore. "It was you? You were that hooded weirdo Jay was going on about?"

"Gee, thanks."

"Hey, look, she was just trying to he– " Jay began just before another wave of pain pulsed from the wound on his head. _"Ahh."_ He slid back down to a marginally less painful sitting position. His vision was starting to go cloudy again, so he gave himself a little shake to try and stay awake.

"Woah, woah, hold on." Jessica grabbed hold of his shoulders to keep him upright.

"You're bleeding." Tim knelt down next to both of them.

"Yeah," Jay grumbled. "Being hit with a cement brick will do that to you."

"Just hang on." Tim stood again to look over the edge of the maintenance shaft. "Called 911 before I went in here. When I heard there was some sort of scuffle by the police station, I figured Alex couldn't be up to anything good. They should be here soon."

"Yeah, well, they have to find us first," Jessica reminded them both grimly.

"Found me easy enough as a kid, didn't they?" Dropping back down to help Jay, Tim grabbed the black mask from Jay's hands, the one Jay hadn't even realized he was still clutching, and gently pressed against the drying blood caked on the side of his head. Jay clenched his teeth with a sharp intake of breath and tried to jerk away.

"Easy, buddy, come on. We're trying to help." Tim firmly pushed the cloth back against Jay's head. "We gotta stop this bleeding."

Jay subsided, albeit somewhat petulantly. For a moment, there was a blessed silence, save for the distant thundering of the fire finally finishing its job on the twice-burned building. So he and Jessica both jumped slightly when Tim abruptly began to chuckle. He stopped when he noticed how the other two were staring at him like he'd finally lost it.

"Sorry, it's just, uh..." Tim shot Jay a vaguely amused look. "Do all your cases go this well?"

"Well, getting clubbed in the head by an assisting officer was certainly a first." Jay was amazed he had managed to keep his sense of humor. At least it was helping him stay focused, stay conscious, and not give into the feeling that his head was about to collapse in on itself. It didn't help that his eyesight now wildly fluctuated between becoming rapidly darker or fuzzing out entirely.

"Still," Jay mumbled. "I'm glad you came back for me."

A look of relief briefly flashed in Tim's eyes, but it vanished as soon as more concern flitted across his face. Jay could feel himself slipping further down the wall.

"Hold on." He could no longer tell whose voice that was. It sounded awfully distant, though. "Just hold on."

 _Hold on to what?_ Jay wondered in an absurd moment of complete disconnection from any kind of awareness. Then, for the second time that day, everything else darkened and went black.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note: Yes, I am aware Jessica is not actually Hoody in the canon of the series itself. But that's why this is an AU.


	11. Disappear

When Jay came to for the second time, he was dimly aware of being leaned against something sturdy and having something sharp smelling and plastic-y pressed against face. He was too tired to resist but was glad he didn't need to when the plastic-y thing turned out to be an oxygen mask.

"Just breathe naturally. You're going to be all right," a paramedic was saying, but Jay was already scanning his surroundings for any sign of Jessica, Tim, or, more apprehensively, Alex. When he couldn't find them in his initial sweep, he felt a small weight descend over his chest. Panic surged through him. He anxiously grabbed the paramedic's shoulder before she could turn away.

" _D – "_ He momentarily forgot that the oxygen mask prevented him from speaking. The paramedic helped him remove it for a moment. "Did anyone else get out?" Jay rasped.

"Your friends both got out okay," she assured him. "Minor injuries due to smoke inhalation but they'll be okay. Try to relax – we need to get you to a hospital to get _that,"_ she indicated the layers of drying blood coating the side of his head, which let out fresh stabs of pain to remind Jay of its presence. "Looked at immediately."

Jay wanted to ask about Alex, but he was already starting to feel dizzy again. The paramedic must have caught on to that since she hastened to place the oxygen mask back around his face. He could faintly hear her telling him to lie back, but it was growing very hard to focus.

He slipped out again.

* * *

Jay didn't know how long it had been since he'd last opened his eyes, but when he finally shook himself awake enough to become aware of his surroundings, everything was white. He was lying on something soft. There was light filtering in through the half-closed blinds over the window and the dull _beep_ of some machine close to his head provided a regular rhythm.

_Hospital?_

He propped himself up on his elbows and tried to sit up. He succeeded, albeit slowly and accompanied by a continuous twinge of pain trickling down from the side of his head.

Further examination of the room he was in confirmed his suspicions, not to mention the IV drip hooked into his arm. Jay resisted the slight pang of nausea that tagged along with that observation – he'd always hated needles.

_Hospital._

He moved to turn so he could stand, but his legs felt stiff and the movement sent small spasms of pain jarring up to his spine. A small groan escaped his lips.

"Jay?"

Jay's breath froze in his throat. The curtain on the non-window side of his bed was pulled back. Behind it stood none other than Tim, looking a little haggard and tired and in some ratty blue-and-white hospital clothes, but smiling.

_Smiling._

"You all right, buddy?"

"Um, I..." Jay realized dazedly that it was the first time he'd ever seen Tim smile. His brain had trouble working out anything beyond that fact. "I think?"

"I'll take that as a yes." Tim sat down at the foot of Jay's bed. He had a bandage wrapped around his right arm and hand but seemed otherwise fine. Better off than Jay probably was, anyway. As quick as it had appeared, the smile was gone, replaced by solemn worry. "You had us scared for a while there."

_Us?_

Jay's confusion must have shown on his face, because Tim hastened to clarify.

"Jessica and me. She's fine, don't worry. Just answering some of the questions I don't know the answers to." His smile twisted into a bitter mockery of itself. "Guess we didn't solve the mystery after all."

"What do you mean?" Jay's brain was still working sluggishly, but he had a sharp recollection of watching a shabby cardboard box full of tapes burst into flames, along with a hollow flash of despair.

"The evidence all burned in the fire," Tim explained somberly. "Kralie's plan worked out, I guess. And we still had one massive hole in our accusation."

"What was that?"

"We still didn't know _why."_

A hole formed in the pit of Jay's stomach.

"Were we wrong, do you think?" he finally brought himself to ask. "I mean, Alex as good as confessed just before he set the place on fire, but he seemed...really torn up about it."

Tim snorted. "What, so I should feel sorry for the guy who killed four people? He _should_ feel torn up about it. They were his _friends."_

Tim's voice trembled faintly as he said the last part. Neither of them commented upon it and Jay didn't pursue the topic. He shrank a little bit more into himself, folding his arms protectively around him, and pretended he couldn't see Tim angrily dashing a hand across one eye.

"Did they find him?" Jay asked in a small voice at last.

"Huh?" Tim didn't seem to be listening, but Jay couldn't really blame him.

"Did they find him?" repeated Jay. "Alex?"

Tim shook his head.

"Gone. Presumed dead like the others. There's no way he got out of that fire alive."

"Right." Jay didn't voice his internal thoughts on the manner, that he hadn't thought there would be any way he or Tim or Jessica could have gotten out alive either, but they'd somehow miraculously made it. The only explanation he could think of was that Alex had _wanted_ to die. Even if taking out Jay had been a side goal, he'd obviously reached the end of his rope by the time they confronted one another in the hospital.

" _I can't live at all."_

Jay didn't think he could ever forget the expression of complete anguish on the officer's face as he'd struck the match, eyes dull with hopelessness but just barely sparking with the relief that came with knowing it would all come to end.

But, most perplexingly, Alex had expressed regret over his actions seven years ago. He had seemed completely broken when he'd obliquely admitted to being responsible for the four disappearances – _deaths,_ Jay reminded himself, remembering that the fate of the four individuals had been pretty much confirmed.

" _He made me."_

That had been the kicker. The statement implied that Alex had been somehow forced into offing his four friends, a factor that Jay hadn't even considered. There was no evidence that anyone had engineered the deaths or that Alex had been pushed into killing them against his will. But if he _had_ been, then by who? And _why?_

The mystery still wasn't done. It still wasn't _done._

Jay leaned back on the too-hard mattress on the hospital bed, running both hands through his hair. He ignored the slight throbs of pain the action sent pulsing through his skull, instead focusing on screwing his eyes shut and burying his mind into trying to remember every single fuzzy detail of what Alex had said just before it all happened.

He just needed to _think –_

Then his fingers hit something that wasn't his hair, and Jay's eyes flew open. He hadn't even noticed the stiff bandage coating the side of his head. He didn't know what he'd expected to find there _–_ that was, after all, the side of his head that Alex had clubbed with the cement brick.

"Watch that," a new voice chimed from the doorway. Jay looked up to see Jessica leaning against the doorway. For the first time in Jay's memory, he could see the ghost of a smile on her face too. "You've been pretty out of it for a few days. A concussion will do that to you."

"You're okay?" Jay asked faintly.

"Fine," she replied, pulling up a chair to sit next to his bed. "Better off than you two, anyway. Minor smoke inhalation, but at least I didn't get my arm sliced open or my head bashed in." She inclined her head at Tim's bandaged arm. Jay frowned at it, silently demanding an explanation.

"You know I don't even remember where this came from?" Tim raised his injured arm to inspect it. "Must have picked it up while I was busy saving your asses."

"Saving our asses?" One of Jessica's eyebrows quirked up in faux surprise. "Please. We were handling it."

Tim looked outraged for a split second before he realized she was joking and a tiny grin fluttered over his face. The look was so uncharacteristically happy for Tim, but this time the grin did not slip away.

"Yeah, you guys looked like you had everything under control, hoodie and all," Tim quipped. "Why were you even running around with a hood and mask on at night, anyway?"

Jessica got a little more self-conscious at that, shrugging her shoulders a little.

"Well, come on. Four people mysteriously disappear from a burning hospital? What happened to them was obvious enough; _why_ it happened wasn't. Amy wasn't the sort to go wandering around in abandoned places by night, and neither were Sarah or Seth. I've suspected there was something the police weren't telling us for a while." Her eyes flicked over to meet Jay's. "When you came around, I guess it was my chance to find out for sure."

"But why the big mystery?" Jay asked, tilting his head inquisitively. "Running around in the dark, keeping your face hidden...couldn't you have just mentioned to me that you thought the police were hiding something?"

"Kind of hard to do that without raising suspicion," Jessica explained. "Besides, you just needed a couple pushes in the right direction. Nothing big."

"You risked a lot to help us out. That was, well, uh...thanks," Jay mumbled. "There were a couple times I would have been screwed without your help." He wished he were better at expressing his gratitude and sincerity. His hooded friend had helped him out of more than a few scrapes.

"Never did find out why, though, did we?" Jessica noted with a somewhat bitter half-smirk.

"Don't think it matters, does it?" Tim interrupted. "You guys did say Alex as good as confessed. Pity he isn't still around to go to jail for it."

"I think _'untimely fiery death'_ is about as serious a punishment as you can go for," reasoned Jessica.

Jay allowed himself to relax. He was surrounded by people he'd grown to care about, people who were casually joking about stupid little things, despite the fact that they all could have died only a few days ago. Jay didn't feel quite the outcast anymore, and that felt good.

And all things considered, it wasn't terribly important if he hadn't gotten the case fully figured out. He'd managed to get out of the hospital alive and maybe helped two people find closure in the process.

At that point, that was what mattered the most.

* * *

A week later, Jay's car was packed with what little luggage he had to begin with, parked on the edge of town.

"Don't be a stranger, all right?" Tim asked as he and Jay shook hands. "Anytime you need someplace to stay, we're here."

"And, you know, if you just wanna stop by and say hello," added Jessica. Jay reached out to shake her hand but she pulled him into a swift hug instead, taking him completely by surprise. She released him just as quickly. "We'd be okay with that."

"Thanks. And not just for this but for, you know, uh...everything." It just wouldn't be goodbye if Jay didn't say _something_ mind-numbingly awkward, wouldn't it? Immediately after he had the thought, he stopped mentally scolding himself. It didn't matter, not when he finally had a place he could possibly call home to come back to for the first time in, well...

...in _years._

Soon Jay was on the road again, peeling away from Rosswood and on his way to whatever next unsolved case was in his future. Bizarrely, Jay hoped that this one would include a lot more paperwork. He could do with a little bit of boring after everything that had happened.

Jay was too far away to see the too-tall dark shape lurking just on the fringes of the wooded area. He didn't see the too-pale face slowly tilt to one side in a manner that seemed almost lazily curious.

And he didn't see the second shape hunched next to it, face stained with soot, bruises, and burns, glasses cracked and askew.

He didn't see the second shape raise its eyes to glare at his car's taillights with cold, murderous rage.

No one did.

* * *

_end_


End file.
